


caught your radio waves

by thisstableground



Series: less than ninety degrees [22]
Category: Do No Harm (TV)
Genre: Bisexuality, Idiots in Love, Kink Negotiation, Multi, Polyamory, Safewords
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-07
Updated: 2020-01-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:47:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22164301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisstableground/pseuds/thisstableground
Summary: Usnavi had assumed that now he's got the "wait, I like guys" and the "wait, we could do a polyamory" sorted, that was pretty much all the learning about his sexuality that he'd have to do, but turns out there's a lot more to navigating a three-way relationship than just deciding which one of them he wants to kiss first.
Relationships: Ruben Marcado/Usnavi (In the Heights)/Vanessa (In the Heights)
Series: less than ninety degrees [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/713601
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	caught your radio waves

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: there's some non-explicit discussion of sexual assault in the context of Ruben having a panic attack mid-sex. Also safeword useage and general negotiations while they all work out who is comfortable with what.

It’s been three weeks since they hooked up and obviously Usnavi’s been near-exploding since That Night waiting for Ruben to confirm that yeah, this is happening again. He holds back as best he can. If Ruben needs them to wait, Usnavi will damn well wait.

Three weeks pays off: it’s Ruben who says _come back to my place,_ it’s Ruben kissing Vanessa leaning against his front door, his fingers in her hair, his fingers hooked in one of Usnavi’s belt loops.

“This is a very good birthday,” Ruben says, when he breaks away for air. It ain’t even Usnavi’s birthday and he’s inclined to say the same.

“So is this a yes?” Vanessa says. Usnavi can hear the smile in her voice.

“Yes,” Ruben says, simple, unstuttered, pulling his tie loose to take it off looking like he’s about to go Clark Kent to Superman. “I’m ready.”

***

To be honest Usnavi goes into it assuming that when it comes down to getting physical, being with Ruben can’t be _all_ that different to being with Vanessa, give or take some different bits and pieces, but hey, Usnavi already know what a dick do even if he can’t for the life of him figure out how Ruben manages to fit so much of one in his mouth. Usnavi sure as hell can’t. And it trips him out a bit the first while, just standing around in the store and suddenly thinking “I fucked a _dude_!” and then having to go about pretending like that thought ain’t in his head.

Other than little details like that, it’s all someone he’s really into being hot and naked in front of him, so asking him to think anything coherent at all is a long shot like, let a boy’s brain melt in peace, por favor. Sex is sex: it’s a way to say _I wanna make you feel good, I wanna feel good with you, I care about you, I got you._ That doesn’t change from Vanessa to Ruben. So it’s really not all that different.

***

Vanessa kisses water droplets off his bare shoulders when he steps out of the shower, follows him to Ruben’s bedroom. Usnavi picks up the sweatpants he was wearing yesterday, borrowed from Ruben after they all got rained out of the park, and extricates the boxers from the leg to throw into Ruben’s laundry. Hey, now that’s something specific to having a _boy_ friend, he could never borrow underwear off Vanessa. Well, okay, he could and has and there’s a je ne sais something about it for sure, but in practical daily-wear terms he’s too busy to be tucking himself back in every five minutes where he’s popped out to one side and Vanessa’s little lacy lady-short things weren’t designed for extra carry-on luggage. And Ruben has _such_ good underwear.

“God, get over it already,” Vanessa says.

“I been wasting my whole life buying boxers from fuckin’ Target while his balls get to be livin’ the high life in those fancy things, what have I been doing?”

“Bein’ too poor for nice stuff?”

"True dat." He says then calls, “I’m stealing another pair of your boxers, Ruben!"

“Go for it!” Ruben yells back from somewhere else in the apartment.

“Holy shit, he folds them all,” Usnavi marvels, opening the drawer. “God bless him but he is one strange-ass dude.”

“Yeah, _he’s_ the strange one,” Vanessa snorts, as Usnavi strokes the top pair: soft things were made to be touched, else what’s the point in them being soft? He riffles through the pile of neatly-folded boxers, trying to find the ones with little rainbows on he’s seen Ruben wear before, when suddenly his hand touches a very different texture. He pauses, pokes curiously, then freezes when he figures out what’s going on under the innocuous top layers of Ruben’s underwear drawer.

“What?” Vanessa asks.

“Mmmnooothing,” Usnavi answers.

Vanessa comes and peeks over his shoulder, and Usnavi shows her, because then at least he’s not the only one dealing with the fact that he just inadvertently discovered Ruben’s sex toy collection.

“Oh, no _way_!” she says. “Guess he wasn’t kidding when he told us he was kinky. What else has he got in there?”

Feeling like the world’s biggest creep but too curious to resist the little Vanessa devil on his shoulder urging him on, Usnavi shuffles various boxers and socks aside. There’s what he was holding, just a standard penis-looking dildo with a suction cup on the end that makes him think of those stuffed animals people stick to their windshield. Another one, slightly smaller, bright blue because of course Ruben sticks with his color scheme even for this. A couple weird-shaped somethings of different sizes that Usnavi has no idea what they’re for: tentative guess, he’s gonna assume it goes in an ass? Some beads that kinda look like a rosary, but a rare sense of self-preservation tells him _not_ to say that to Vanessa because he’s almost definitely wrong. He picks up the blue thing and fiddles with it, then nearly drops it when he accidentally presses something that makes it go _vrrrrrrr-!_ very loudly.

“¡Mierda!” he says, turning it off and hoping that Ruben didn’t hear.

Vanessa falls back down on the bed with her witchy cackle of a laugh. “Oh, our dirty doctor done got himself all kinds of tricks up his sleeve. Who’da thought he’d have it in him?”

“Who’da thought he’d have _this_ in him? It’s huge,” Usnavi says, picking up the first one because there’s no buttons on it so it probably won’t start yelling at him, although it does wobble in an unsettling way.

Vanessa gives it an assessing look and says, “it’s like six inches, that’s smaller than you.”

Yo, what is she, the dildo whisperer, how can she tell that just from looking? Usnavi turns it over in his hands, trying to figure out the appeal. “Why’d they design it with balls? Nobody likes balls really.”

“Iuno, realism? And because you gotta have a wide base on it.”

“Yours doesn’t.”

“Yeah but you gotta for ass stuff, so it don’t get lost up there,” Vanessa says, in a tone that implies everyone knows that, which Usnavi definitely fuckin’ didn’t.

“Jeeesus, I think I just clenched up forever, that _happens?!”_

“Not if you get the ones with baaalls on,” she singsongs, taking it off him to poke him in the cheek with it.

“Gimme that,” Usnavi says, grabbing it to return to its place in the drawer and carefully re-folding everything to cover it. Glad she’s having a great time: Usnavi’s just burning with sympathetic embarrassment. “Don’t say nothing to him about this.”

“Aw, ruin all my fun, why don’tcha?”

“C’mon, Vanessa, this is really private stuff. I don’t think he even meant to tell us half that shit he said when we was drunk.”

“God, you always gotta be so damn thoughtful, _fine._ I won’t say nothing.”

“Bueno.” In honesty, Usnavi also don’t wanna get into this quite yet. He’s not disgusted or nothing. This is just a disruptively new emotion, the same as thinking about the things Ruben was telling them he was into on Friday night after too much wine: a little turned on and a lot intrigued and hopelessly, nervously out of his depth, suddenly aware that maybe there’s more to sex and more to dudes and more to Ruben and Vanessa than the simplicity of fun and trust and hella orgasms.

But! There’s a whole Sunday ahead of them to enjoy in other ways, so it ain’t nothing that needs thinking about yet. Usnavi’s always a big fan of never crossing a bridge until he’s already tripped onto it.

***

Over time Usnavi and Vanessa learn how there’s small things in a chain reaction, so small that they’re only seen in terms of effect like the dust particles that set off a sneezing fit. It isn’t always possible to know how a flashback starts. There’s the time they’re all in the bodega giggling over something Sonny says and Ruben suddenly bursts into inconsolable tears mid-laugh. There’s the sentences that suddenly cut off in the middle like Ruben’s a video that needs buffering, frozen in unnatural stillness on a slow connection.

Theres a time that starts out with Ruben on his knees unzipping Usnavi’s pants, not the first time and as good as all the others, when on a dime this one turns into Ruben locked in the bathroom, Vanessa talking to him through the door - “honey, it’s only me, I’m here, I got you”. Usnavi’s still in the bedroom choking back tears: everything had been _fine_ and then out of nowhere, Ruben had looked up at him, looked through him to someone somewhere sometime else, and he’d said _that_ name, with terror and resignation and defiance.

Later, in the settled dust of the fallout, Usnavi asks if there’s anything else they should know, anything Ruben hasn’t told them. Vanessa’s asked about that before. Usnavi needs to be certain.

“No, it was just… there wasn’t any reason, I don’t know why that happened,” Ruben says. He’s in Vanessa’s arms, facing towards Usnavi which means he can’t see what Usnavi can, the way Vanessa’s screwing up her face to keep herself from crying. “I don’t _know_ , he didn’t do that. Nothing like that.”

Usnavi bites the inside of his cheek. How can Ruben say it’s nothing like that, when it was enough like that for tonight to remind him?

Almost five minutes of silence later and Ruben says, in a whisper, “I thought he was going to,” and Usnavi isn’t really surprised.

***

Sometimes things go wrong and sometimes things go new but mostly things go good, go better the more they learn how to work with each other and nobody mentions any bewildering sex toys, so it’s all not _too_ different from Vanessa until _whoomp_ , there a bridge, and not one Usnavi was aware they were gonna have to cross.

Vanessa’s got Ruben underneath her and she says “tell me what you want,” breathy, intense.

“You,” Ruben says, utterly adoring.

Vanessa laughs and kisses his cheek, stays close by his ear to say “yes, but specifics. I know you got big ideas up there.”

“I—“ Ruben hesitates. “You might think I’m weird.”

“You already told us all your kinky little secrets, I’m just asking you to pick a card.”

Ruben’s request is incredibly simple, and the last thing Usnavi expected: “I want you to hit me,” he says.

Usnavi’s brain goes ¡¿?!, and doesn’t come up with much else. Why the _hell_ would Ruben want that?

Vanessa looks wary, says, “Really? Just straight _hit_ you? Like, where?”

“Anywhere. Face,” Ruben says, then adds, “open-handed, don’t wreck my shop.”

“Well, I wasn’t gonna fuckin’ punch your teeth in, dude.” She looks from Ruben to her own hand and back again as she raises it. “You sure about this?”

Wait, she’s actually gonna do it?

“I’m extremely sure.”

“Aite, your call.” Vanessa wiggles her fingers like she’s warming them up. “Ready, baby?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Ruben says without any hesitation.

 _No?_ Usnavi thinks, with the same kind of muscle-twitch anxiety he used to get when fights broke out at school – should he do something to stop this? - but too late: the slap hits, not all that hard but very loud, and the sound Ruben makes is indescribable.

Usnavi breathes out steadily through his nose. Alright. That wasn’t so bad.

Ruben definitely liked it, at least, his hand instantly going to jerk himself off roughly, quickly. “Vanessa,” he groans. “Holy shit _.”_

“Was that okay?” Vanessa says, touching his cheek in concern. “I didn’t hit too hard?”

Ruben kisses her. “Do it _harder_ ,” he says, lips still against Vanessa’s.

“Okay,” she says, gleeful this time. One hand makes a fist in his hair pulling his head back and up and she slaps him like she means it this time, once then twice and hard enough to leave a bright pink mark. Usnavi flinches on both impacts. Ruben doesn’t, mouth open to gasp harsh breaths in, already over the edge. His eyes are shining. Might be excitement, it might be tears, or both. Vanessa pets his cheek, kisses the handprint she left there, leans her forehead against his: both of them are giggling in delighted shock and she calls him _honey, gorgeous, baby_. It’s all just fun.

 _(But she’s **hitting**_ _him.)_

Usnavi appeases the ache in his chest by kissing Ruben softly, softly, nothing changed, nothing broken. Takes Vanessa’s hand in his: she strokes her thumb over his own and it makes him feel better, because Vanessa’s always been sweet touches to rough attitude and sharp tongue, there’s no danger to her. It’s fine. Usnavi’s definitely fine with this.

***

And he is, to an extent, when he sticks to things like gently pressing his teeth against Ruben’s shoulder barely enough to bruise, like holding Ruben’s wrists down but never leaving fingerprints. The rest of it Usnavi leaves to Vanessa, and they’re both too distracted to notice that he always looks away during those parts, just one of those little Ruben quirks that Usnavi can live with if it means everyone’s having a good time, and then one day Ruben says “hit me,” and it’s not Vanessa he’s looking at.

“W-what?” Usnavi says. “I—me?”

“Yes.” Ruben’s looking at him, amending to “yes, _please_?” and biting his lip with that puppy-eyes pleading face. Fuck, Usnavi would give him the goddamn world if he could.

He lifts his hand, slowly. Ruben tilts his head to present his cheek a little, waiting, vulnerable. Vanessa’s watching with interest. Usnavi doesn’t _understand_ this. He doesn’t understand why Vanessa, who would kill anyone who upset Ruben, doesn’t mind doing it, he doesn’t understand why Ruben wants this brought somewhere he’s supposed to be safe. He’s supposed to be _happy_ now, supposed to be taken care of. Doesn’t he know he deserves better than pain?

Usnavi’s seen how Ruben acts different around Benny, Kevin, even around Sonny sometimes. And it’s so much worse with dudes Ruben doesn’t know in the store: he always edges closer to him as soon as they come in, directly at his side like he’s torn between hiding behind Usnavi and hiding Usnavi behind him. So it don’t take a genius to work out that, with very good reason, Ruben’s scared of men.

Except Usnavi. Even with the roadbumps that jolt them all around sometimes, it’s clear that Ruben isn’t scared of Usnavi: he lets Usnavi stand behind him, lets Usnavi stand between him and the door, he’ll let himself sleep when Usnavi’s in the room. He lets Usnavi _see_ him, touch him, know him. And now Ruben’s here saying _hit me_ and Usnavi has his hand in the air, unbearably torn between the knowledge that Ruben deserves everything he ever asks for in life and the conviction that, whatever it is that made Usnavi Ruben’s exception, he can’t betray that. He has to be worth the weight of it.

“I-I can’t do it,” he says. “I ain’t doin’ it.”

“Oh, uh, o-okay?” Ruben says, sounding surprised, like the idea that Usnavi might _not_ wanna slap his boyfriend hadn’t even occurred to him.

“I ain’t gonna do it,” Usnavi repeats urgently. He brings his hand down to his chest, clasps his other one round the wrist to be sure it’s held still, appalled that he even considered it. “I ain’t gonna hurt you, Ruben, I don’t ever want you to think I’d—I don’t _ever_ want this to be something you’re scared of. I want you to feel safe with me.”

“Hey, I know, I do.” Ruben pulls Usnavi to his side, dots his temple with quick, repeating little kisses. “I do feel safe, that’s why I asked, but you don’t have to do it.”

Vanessa shuffles closer and puts her arm around him too. It’s funny how he’s the one being comforted when Ruben’s the one who was about to get slapped. “Do you want me to stop hitting him in front of you, too?” she asks.

“I don’t wanna stop you guys doing a thing you like…”

“And I ain’t doing something that makes you uncomfortable. Me and Ruben can save it for our date nights. Do you want us to stop?”

Usnavi nods.

“Then we stop,” Vanessa says, laying her head on his shoulder and Usnavi leans his head against hers, relieved. Vanessa and Ruben can still get what they want, and Usnavi never has to be the reason Ruben’s crying on his knees. That works a lot better.

***

There’s small things: Three toothbrushes in a cup, three mugs on the countertop. Usnavi fixing Vanessa’s coffee while Vanessa fixes Ruben’s tie while Ruben fixes a mistake in Usnavi’s math on the post-it of his monthly budget that he’s got stuck to the fridge. A routine they settle into that means Usnavi sleeps in the middle on the nights they spend together, he wakes up with company more often than he wakes up alone. There’s small things, the way it only takes two tiny letters for _like_ to turn into something more.

Unconsciously he and Vanessa have been saying it less while Ruben is around, because it felt strange to not include him and felt too soon to put that on him. But now they’re here all three in love out loud Usnavi can’t stop saying it all the time, those three repeating words in a kickdrum-hi hat-snare, and Usnavi’s heart is always singing singing singing so much he doesn’t know how they can sleep through the sound like they do, so close on either side of him.

***

Morning sex and shower sex and didn’t even make it to the bedroom sex, silly or sweet or slow, almost unbearably emotional sex, a three can interlock in so many variations that it feels like they could go every day for a full year and never repeat it quite the same, different combinations, different moods.

Vanessa’s the one who says, low in Ruben’s ear, “you should fuck him.”

Ruben pauses for a long time, drawing heart shapes on the back of Usnavi’s neck while he thinks. “Do you want me to do that, Usnavi?”

Huh. Three months in and Usnavi’s honestly never even contemplated it. _Does_ he want to? Ruben always seems to have a good time with it.

“Will it hurt?” he asks, warily.

“Not if we do it right,” Ruben says.

“And if we do it wrong…?”

“We won’t. I’ll take care of you.”

Which of course he will, so Usnavi says “yeah, then let’s do this! How should I…be? Like what position’s easiest?”

“Whichever you’re most comfortable with.”

A quick mental montage of too many possibilities to count so he goes for how he remembers Ruben’s first time with him: all fours, Ruben behind him. Vanessa sits to the side. Wow. He’s gonna get fucked, then. That’s a whole thing he’ll have to unpack his thoughts on later when he’s not preoccupied with anticipation and all the blood in his body rushing right to one area.

“I love you,” Ruben says, serious and sincere, and Usnavi’s heart squeezes in his chest happily. Ruben loves Usnavi and Usnavi loves Ruben and they both love Vanessa who loves them too, and what could possibly be better than that, other than that plus Vanessa touching Usnavi’s shoulder, his hair while Ruben circles him slowly with a slick finger, asks if he’s ready.

“Yeah.”

“You like that?” Vanessa asks him, one hand on the flat of his back to keep him still while Ruben touches him. It’s unfamiliar, but there’s a quiet hum of definite pleasure as he gets used to it, so he makes an affirmative sound, lets Ruben set pace, revels in being loved. Dammit, he loves them both so much.

Ruben says “you ready for more?” and Usnavi answers “sure” without really thinking about it. Two fingers definitely feels more but more _what,_ he doesn't know. Bad? Doesn’t seem to match any of his current understandings of Bad: I Definitely Do Not Like This feelings. Good? Hm. Speech bubble with a ¿? inside it. Or a message on a magic eight ball: answer unclear, ask again later. Maybe the position wasn’t the best choice after all: he can’t see either of their faces, and he wishes they would talk a little more to make up for it, and he wishes the lights were a little less bright.

Vanessa says “you good, baby?” and Usnavi says “yeah, I’m good,” figuring if they get through this preparation work faster he’ll get to the good part quicker. Usnavi’s used to the pace of the world being out of step with his, his inability to tolerate waiting for anything meaning that sometimes his mind goes for a bit of wander until whatever it is he’s waiting for arrives. He’s got entire universes crammed into his head to browse through like a DVD library, he jumps from one to the next at speed: his whole thought structure is a series of Super Mario levels of songs and stories and things to get done.

He tries to remember if he put the chain on the front door and can clearly picture his hand sliding it into place but can’t remember if that was from today or yesterday or last year. A memory of a sense memory of a scent he’s craving but can’t put a name to. A memory of the way it feels to stand on a train in motion. A little pixellated version of Usnavi leaps around up platforms and down pipes in an emotionally neutral blur of jangly 8-bit music and sentence fragments, idly wondering how other people usually visualize their internal space-out journeys because his is always pretty rad.

“Ruben, red, _stop_ ,” Vanessa says sharply.

Usnavi spaces back in from a detour in the thought vacation that was simultaneously his grocery list and an incoherent mashup of every song in West Side Story at the sensation of Ruben pulling his fingers out, which is a feeling like when you just realized you’ve been clenching your jaw for ages and the pleasant _that’s better_ of finally relaxing it.

“Vanessa?” Ruben says, nervous. “What’s wrong?”

“Usnavi,” she answers.

“Hm?” Usnavi says. “Why’d we stop?”

“You weren’t into it,” Vanessa says, “were you?”

Shit, he wasn’t actually paying enough attention to be sure one way or the other. The few seconds it takes him to try and give a legit answer is long enough for Ruben to basically throw himself almost off the other end of the bed away from Usnavi, looking absolutely horrified.

“You didn’t like it?” he says. “You don’t want to do this?”

“What? No, of course I do, it was fine —“

“It was ‘ _fine’_?” Ruben says, going all pitchy. “Usnavi, that’s not what people say when they like something!”

“It _was_ fine! Really! It just felt kinda…off, but I bet I’ll like it once I’m used to it,” Usnavi tries to reassure him, and apparently fails miserably, because Vanessa makes a disbelieving sound and Ruben just shakes his head. “C’mon, it’s all good. I’m just nervous, everyone’s always nervous their first time. We can just push through it and—where are you goin’?“ because at that point Ruben leaves the room without saying anything.

Usnavi looks at Vanessa for any kind of clarification but all she says is “what the _fuck_ , dude,” and picks up the t-shirt he tossed on the floor earlier to put on. Usnavi tugs the covers over his lap, wondering what it is he’s done that seems to have made them mad at him. Kinda wishes he could go shower: there’s a time and a place for being this specific kind of sticky and it ain’t now, but the water’s running in the bathroom, and Ruben maybe doesn’t want his company?

Ruben comes back from the bathroom, boxers and t-shirt, clean hands which he hides his face behind when he sits down right on the edge of the bed, leaning forward.

“Are you okay?” Usnavi asks. Ruben shakes his head. “I’m…I don’t know what I did, but I’m sorry.”

“ _You’re—? I_ should be the one apologizing,” Ruben says. “I didn’t even—fuck, I-I-I mean, what if Vanessa hadn’t been here? Would you have just let me carry on?”

“No,” Usnavi says.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Alright, yeah, I probably woulda done, but I guess I just don’t see why everyone’s so fired up about it? You didn’t hurt me or nothing.”

“You really don’t get it?” Vanessa asks, and he shakes his head. “You remember our first time together how we were both kinda nervous? And I told you if you wanted to wait it was cool and you said the same thing to me but we both agreed we was ready?”

“Yeah?”

“Bueno, now imagine instead of _I’m ready_ I’d said _I’ll push through it,_ would you still have gone ahead and fucked me?”

“No, I — _ohhh_! _”_ When you put it like that, it sounds bad. Sounds a lot worse than it had felt, really, they’re definitely far more upset than he is, but it’s true he wouldn’t ever be cool with working on anything less than an enthusiastic yes. “Aw. Shit.”

“Aw shit exactly. You’re meant to tell us if you don’t like something, honey, we can’t read your mind.”

Yeah, only he still isn’t sure that he didn’t like it. It was more exposing than he’d anticipated, giving more of himself than he’d really understood was there to let someone actually inside his body and it had surprised him into the easier option of spacing out, for reasons he can’t understand. But he wasn’t scared, or hurt, he never has been scared or hurt that way. He was never the one standing in an abandoned warehouse being told to take his clothes off, he isn't the one who walks around at night with his keys between his knuckles as a reflex.

Usnavi knows this shit happens, that Ruben and Vanessa in their different ways deal with things he’s never even had to think about for himself. The worst _Usnavi_ ’s ever dealt with personally when it comes to sex is his tendency to trip over his own pants when he’s getting undressed, so why the hell would he of all people be feeling weird about doing a thing he’s pretty sure he wants to do with two people he trusts more than anything?

“I don’t get it though,” he says. “Ruben lets me fuck him and he’s got way more reason not to want nothing like that. I should be fine with it, right?”

“I don’t _let_ you fuck me,” Ruben says. “I _want_ you to. Big difference.”

“You don’t need a reason,” Vanessa says. “ _I don’t want to_ is enough.”

“But I do want to! That’s the thing, I do want to, but I’m glad we stopped, but I’m confused. _”_

“Maybe it’s just too fast. Maybe you ain’t ready.”

Ruben says, “think about it, I knew I was into guys since I hit puberty, you thought you were straight until a few months ago. I’ve been thinking about this stuff way longer than you. You’ve seen my drawer, I’m clearly no stranger to putting things up me.”

Usnavi laughs at that, and at himself too for being kind of a moron. The idea of taking things slow genuinely hadn’t occurred to him. Most of the time it feels like _now or never_ is always the only choice for anything, when it could just be _now or slightly later_ instead.

“But you have have to _tell_ us when you’re not feeling something,” Ruben insists, “for our sake if not your own. I’d never forgive myself if I did something that—if I— I can’t do it, okay? So don’t make me.”

“Okay. Okay, I hear you, I’m sorry.”

There’s a lull in the conversation while they all try to figure out what to say next, so Usnavi fills it by asking, “am I boring at sex?”, which earns him a Sad Ruben Face instead. Usnavi marks that in the losing column of the constant mental tally of Did I Make Them Happy?

“Is that why you were gonna do this? Because you think we think you’re boring?”

“Iuno,” Usnavi says, because he doesn’t know. “Do you think that?”

Sarcastic Ruben Face. That’s a better one. “Yes, it’s _so_ boring to keep getting fucked senseless by my hot, hung, thoughtful, funny boyfriend, I’ll have to start bringing a book to bed to pass the time.”

“If you was boring at sex do you really think I’da given up all my one-night stands to bang you on the regular?” Vanessa says, in an _ain’t this too obvious to even discuss_ tone.

“Even though I won’t slap anyone and I don’t own no sex toys and Ruben didn’t fuck me and I ruined the mood again?”

“Even though. Babe, last week you made me come three times in a row then brought us ice-cream in bed, if that ain’t five star service right there.”

“I did do that,” Usnavi says. “I guess I _am_ pretty amazing, ain’t I?”

“Oh, I sent him too far the other direction. Ruben, balance it out, say something mean.”

Ruben finally comes back to sit next to Usnavi, nudges him with an elbow then goes for the full cuddle, arms and legs wrapped around koala-style. “You’re amazing,” he says.

***

Weeks keep going by and sex keeps being great, and Usnavi’s always on top. Ruben doesn’t even mention what happened, never mind asking if he wants to try it again, so Usnavi assumes it’s up to him to initiate next time. But how’s he supposed to _know_ when it’s time, if he needed Vanessa to tell him when it wasn’t?

He asks her how she could tell he wasn’t into it and she just shrugs and says “‘cause I know you?”, which is a) very sweet and b) fuckin’ useless in terms of practical application. So Usnavi asks the one person he always asks for romantic advice, the one way he always asks: while sitting upside-down with his head hanging off the edge of Benny’s couch playing playing PUBG and doing badly at it.

“But I thought you been sleeping with Ruben since the start, have I missed something?” Benny says,eyes still fixed on the TV screen. “Yo, I can’t see you, where you at?”

“Up the stairs. I…yeah, I been sleeping with him, but not vice-versa, you get me?”

“I see y- oh shit, we got contact! On the right! No, that’s left, on your— _nice,_ and no, I don’t get you. Careful!”

Usnavi flawlessly executes his expert gamer strategy - wild button-mashing while shouting - and then adds. “I’m saying I’ve, y’know, given but I ain’t received. I pitched but ain’t caught. I been the plug but not the outlet, the letter not the envelope, the hot dog not the—“

“Jeez, okay, I get it.”

“You sure? Because I got a ton of these and I don’t know when else I’m gonna use ‘em. _Fuck_ , I’m gettin’ my ass kicked, I need res! ”

“I’m sure. Hold up, I got first aid. We get their whole squad?”

“Yeah, last guy was insta-kill, I think we’re clear.”

“Good, ‘cause you suck at multitasking. Um, I thought that with two guys you uh, just pick a role and stick to it and even while I’m saying it I’m realizing that ain’t how it works, is it?”

“Yeeeah, that ain’t it.”

“Sorry,” Benny says, with an apologetic grimace; Usnavi makes a _no worries_ gesture. “This ain’t my wheelhouse.”

“Is it weird I asked? It’s just whenever it’s girls—“

“Not weird, just don’t expect me to know what the fuck I’m talkin’ about,” Benny says. “You didn’t like it?”

“I didn’t _not_ like it,” Usnavi says. “It didn’t hurt or nothing, it was just…like, emotionally more than I was expecting. Vanessa says I’m probably just rushing into it too much.”

“Well shit, bro, guess you just gotta wait then.”

“That ain’t much advice, Benny.”

“S’all I got. Aite, look at me and Nina, we were together night one, and I remember it took you and Vanessa way longer, so how’d you know with her when it was the right time?”

Usnavi frowns to himself, trying to remember. “Iuno. I looked at her and I could just tell.”

“Well, there you go then,” Benny says. “Don’t overthink it, that’s all I’m sayin’.”

“Cool,” Usnavi says. “Next question: how do I stop overthinking things?”

“Can’t unteach a fish to swim,” Benny says, and then selects his AK on the weapons screen and instantly shoots Usnavi in the head.

***

The next time he feels ready it’s Vanessa who he asks, and sure enough as soon as he brings it up Ruben shuffles back a few inches and makes it clear he’s just observing. Gives it a weird kind of taking-his-driving-test feel but not in a way Usnavi’s objecting to. He likes it when Ruben watches.

Vanessa makes a _considering it_ clicky noise with her tongue and says “you swear you’ll tell me when it’s too much? Or even if you just ain’t sure?” and Usnavi promises he will, and because Usnavi keeps his promises he makes sure to pay attention, to how it feels and the tingle up his spine that says _I like this_ and _yes, more, I like this_ when she goes to two fingers and paying attention when the itch down his neck starts saying _I like this and everything’s getting loud and where did I leave my hat? And what’s that one song with the thing that goes like woosh at the start, you know, with the guy?. I like this and my teeth feel like they’re vibrating, kinda, like with your head against the window of a car while you’re sleeping in the back of the cab —_

He shakes his head and says, “that's enough, actually?”

She stops, immediately.”Better, querido?”

“Yeah. Yes. Come kiss me.”

“So demanding,” she tuts, but she does that too because she is the greatest girl.

Not the next time but the time after, Ruben asks Usnavi if he wants it and Usnavi feels like he’s just aced a test he failed before. So this is how they do sometimes, and sometimes more and sometimes less, no pre-emptive nerves for after this and after that, just reveling in a very good present tense under two pairs of careful loving hands. Usnavi’s never been ungrateful for a now. It’s all anyone has and what he has now is more than he ever could imagined, he doesn’t need to psyche himself out thinking about the next _more_ just yet. Life is good, sex is good, hearing about Vanessa-and-Ruben times after the fact when they can cut details to make it Usnavi-friendly is good, that time they tie Usnavi up and have their wicked way with them is every synonym for good in the English and Spanish dictionaries plus a few extras that he’ll have to make up just for the occasion because hot _damn_. All the circuits utterly blown on Usnavi’s already busted verbal filter so his entire brain is babbling out of his mouth, love and need and “you can fuck me or I’ll suck your dick or you can come on my face, please—“

Ruben maybe doesn’t hear him say it in the general sex chaos, and Usnavi doesn’t remember about it till days later when he wakes up solo with enough time to get in some pre-work jerking, when his own voice saying _you can fuck me_ is playing in his head, when in this imaginary version Ruben says _okay_ and unties him, flips him over, and suddenly Usnavi’s scrambling for the lube on his knees with one hand in front keeping him steady on the mattress, it’s like half past six in the morning and he’s fucking himself with two fingers and where in the hell did _this_ come from, por favor, but he ain’t gonna stop when it feels this way.

He ends up almost an hour late opening the store, where parts of his soul keep dying every time a customer asks why he wasn’t around for them to get their pre-work coffee earlier and is everything okay because he’s never late. Privately, he’s thinking maybe about to get a whole lot okayer soon if he’s reading his own signs correctly, then the very next week someone puts in an offer to buy the store.

***

Usnavi’s Journey To Bangdom gets put on major backburner for near on six weeks, for reasons of Bodega Gone and Nearly Died That One Time and Network Connectivity Problem In The Pants and no, having malfunctioning junk don’t help with the depression at all, thanks for asking. On the upside, absence making the heart grow whatever, he’s never been as overjoyed to have morning wood as he is now, after a four day stretch free of post-almost-murder anxiety attacks and a particularly pleasant night of dreams. He’s so happy to see it that he accidentally announces “yo, I’m hard again!” loud enough to stir the other two out of their post-alarms five-more-minutes of sleep.

Ruben lifts the quilt and says “¡bienvenido, Usnavi’s erection!”, then mimes like he’s shaking a celebratory bottle of champagne then popping it. Or maybe he’s miming jerking off very enthusiastically with happy ending, but either way.

“Can Usnavi’s erection be quieter before eight AM, ¿por favor?” Vanessa says. She lays her hand over the front of his boxers. “Good _morning_ , Usnavi.”

“I’ll say,” Usnavi agrees.

***

Vanessa leaves, but they find ways to keep her here, even when it comes to coming: there’s Vanessa’s voice murmuring instructions down the phone quiet so her housemates can’t overhear; there’s the videos Usnavi sends her, shaky camerawork from the motion of his other arm; there’s the nerves of having to check five times every time that he’s not sending pictures in the wrong text conversation; there’s that one time Vanessa forgets to lock her door and now Nina knows a _whole_ lot more about some things than any of them ever needed. There’s never as much Vanessa as Usnavi want, he misses her, he misses her, but he’d be patient for four _thousand_ months just so long as she came back to him at the end.

And Ruben is here: Ruben’s fingers, delicate and steady as they turn over the leaves of all his plants checking carefully that everything’s in order; Ruben patiently talking Usnavi through a bit of an emotional evening murmuring _I know, I know, I love you_ ; Ruben in the shower with his bangs wet against his forehead, in the middle of the night sighing out pleasure against Usnavi’s skin, in the morning half-asleep half-hard against Usnavi’s thigh; Ruben dressed in Comfy Weekend Ruben clothes.

Comfy Weekend Ruben is one of Usnavi’s favorites: the boy get _cuddly._ “Hey there, pretty thing,” Usnavi says as Ruben wraps his arms around his waist to watch him do the dishes.

“What do you think Vanessa’s doing right now?” Ruben asks, thoughtfully.

“Paparazzing with the rich and famous and glitzy and glamorous, I guess. And here’s us cleaning the kitchen.”

“I can be glitzy and glamorous.”

“You’re wearing sweatpants.”

“I’ll get some of the ones with a word in sequins across the butt.”

“Cute. What woud they say?”

“ _Ruben_ , probably. What would yours say?”

“I don’t got room to write nothin’, Vanessa always says I got no ass. Except usually she’s groping it when she says that, so mixed messages there.”

“She’s definitely into it,” Ruben confirms. “I’m also into it.”

“Feel free to _get into it_ any time,” Usnavi says, wiggles his eyebrows even though Ruben can’t see his face, then wiggles his hips, and follows it completely unexpectedly with “hey, do you wanna, though?”

“Hm?”

“Do you wanna…y’know,” Usnavi says. Now he’s thought it he might as well commit: Usnavi’s impulse ideas are always either his best ideas or his absolute worst, and Ruben fits perfectly curved against him at his back, and the tug in the pit of his stomach right now isn’t anything like nerves, just a rolling grabb _want that_ feeling. He dries his hands and turns around.

Ruben says, “for the sake of avoiding a hilarious confusion you should probably tell me out loud.”

“Do you wanna—I want you to fuck me.”

“Bwuh.” Ruben clears his throat, wide-eyed. “Uh. Right here? Now? _Me_?”

“No, dude, I was thinking next Tuesday in Times Square,” Usnavi says, rolling his eyes. “I kinda pictured a bed, but now, and you, yeah.”

“Oh, jeez,” Ruben says, in a helium voice.

“Is that a yes?” Usnavi asks, hopefully.

Ruben grabs his hand and drags him at a run towards the bedroom.

***

He doesn’t even remember getting in there in the blur; one minute Usnavi’s doing dishes and next he’s got half his clothes off on the bed, shirt hanging off his shoulder and tank top pushed all the way up round his armpits, jeans caught around one ankle, Ruben’s sweatpants and boxers on the floor while he’s got Usnavi’s legs apart and rutting frantically up against him.

“Wait—“ Ruben groans, as if he’s not the one doing all the action.

“Been waitin’,” Usnavi objects, open-mouth kissing along Ruben’s neck, tongue against his skin. “Time to do.”

“ _Wait,”_ Ruben says again, stilling his movements with obvious effort. Usnavi waits but Ruben just kisses him sweet, kisses him vulnerable: the palm of Ruben’s hand is over Usnavi’s sternum, Usnavi touches spun-sugar-delicate at the front of Ruben’s throat and feels the vibration of the syllable under his finger when Ruben says “hey.”

“Hey, there.”

Ruben smiles briefly, then looks into Usnavi’s eyes. “You’re not just doing this because Vanessa isn’t here, right?”

“Why would I—“

“I don’t want you to think you need to be both of you to be enough for me.”

Usnavi shakes his head. “Honest, I been thinking about this for a while. If December hadn’t been a hell nightmare and that thing where my stuff was too sad to work I probably woulda asked forever ago.”

“Just…tell me you want it, and I’ll believe you. I need to hear you say it again.”

Usnavi flips them over so that he’s on top, hips rolling down. “Does it _feel_ like I want it?” he says. He doesn’t feel nervous or pressured or not enough. He feels like he rules the fucking world right now.

“So _say_ it.”

“I want you,” Usnavi says. “C’mon, Ruben, stick a dick in already.”

Ruben laughs, silly genuine giggle, Usnavi’s favorite. “Okay, I’ll buy it. But slow down a little, if we’re gonna do this I want to do it right.”

***

Slow means: taking the rest of their clothes off to let their palms map out each other’s geography in touches and shapes, topography of Usnavi who’s a flat landscape and Ruben, his boy a texture map of woven highways. Usnavi used to try not to draw attention to the fact he was touching the scars but these days he forgets himself and always ends up following their path with the side of his thumb, forgets they mean _pain_ because they also just mean _Ruben_ and sometimes those two things are the same but right now it only means that Ruben’s comfortable letting Usnavi follow all his roads. Ruben’s fingers down Usnavi’s sides, travelling each rib individually, the touch at the tendons on the inside of his thighs and Usnavi rolls over, complains at the coldness of the lube while Ruben holds him open and pours it straight on him.

“Tell me if things get too much,” Ruben says and even though Usnavi promises he will, Ruben keeps asking, keep checking,“is this okay?” and “are you okay?” every few minutes.

All of it is more than fuckin’ okay, Usnavi is gasping out against the sheets at one and two and then a third until something new: Ruben moving his fingers apart a little, stretching him out, and Usnavi thinks about what he’s preparing him for with the hairs raising up on his arms. It’s not a bad anticipation, but an awareness of the fact that this time there’s a Something Next gonna happen.

“Ruben,” he says, muffled against his own arm. “Can we stop a second?”

“Of course,” Ruben murmurs quietly to him, stops what he’s doing. “What’s up?”

“I don’t know. Just nervous, I guess.”

“There's no rush,” Ruben reminds him. “I really don’t mind if it takes all night. Or another year. Or never. Nothing until you’re ready.”

Not quite all night but it takes more time than Usnavi can exist in, anything more than a couple minutes being what may as well be eternity. Ruben, moving to kiss the backs of Usnavi’s thighs then pouring more lube on him before he presses his dick against Usnavi’s ass. Usnavi trips out for a second at thinking: _well that sure is going inside me later_ , but he cranes his head to make out with Ruben over his shoulder, and he gets used to this too: the weight and the heat of Ruben hard and pushing against him and Usnavi’s saying “I’m ready, I’m ready.”

Ruben plants a little kiss just behind Usnavi’s ear. “You wanna stay like this, or?”

“No. I wanna look at you.”

“Some might call that questionable taste.” Ruben flops down on the bed, then sits back up and points at the top drawer. “Oh, condom or no? Less messy.”

He’s already covered in like half a bottle of lube, it’s a lost battle. Definitely already got it on Ruben’s sheets, too, the towel they laid down under him crumpled off uselessly to one side. “Nah, fuck it.”

“That’s the plan.” Ruben settles back in a half-lying, half-sitting position against the pillows. “You still nervous?”

“Nope,” Usnavi says, absolutely certain. “You?”

“Terrified,” Ruben says, cheerfully. “I really don’t wanna mess this up for you.”

“Positive attitude, querido, you’re meant to promise to blow my mind right out the back of my skull.”

“Uh, I’ll try?”

And then it’s time, Ruben holding himself in place and Usnavi kneeling over him, sinking onto it, and it’s happening. Adjusting to the feel of himself being entered, a moment where he knows he’s not even got the head in and feels like he can’t take any more, like physically his body won’t allow it but it’s really just that it’s all happening _so_ slow _._

 _Be patient_ , he reminds himself, although he doesn’t think he could make himself go faster anyway: this is a lot going on. Ruben is shaking a little underneath him, hands clenched at his sides.

“You good, hermoso?”

“Trying not to move till you’re ready,” Ruben says through gritted teeth like even moving his mouth too much might be a problem.

Usnavi laughs, motions for Ruben to take his hands then presses at his curled-in fingers so they open and lay flat on Usnavi’s legs. He wonders what Ruben was thinking the first time Usnavi did this to him, or the first time he did it to himself and what it was like for Vanessa the first time she fucked either of them, scent memory of her perfume, taste memory of the first night with Ruben that was Usnavi’s first ever time sucking dick, imagined near-future memory of how Ruben’s gonna make him feel imagined further-future-memory of when Vanessa gets to watch this happen and and something too big to be any memory of how good they _always_ makes him feel. Ruben’s hands sliding under his legs to help Usnavi keep his balance, trying not to move but unable to stop himself on that last little bit, a tiny twitch upwards and then Usnavi’s taken all of him.

“Oh,” Usnavi says, surprised, because he’d sort of forgotten other things existed than a series of partial unchased thoughts and the feeling of being filled. “That’s it?”

Ruben gives a flat look off to one side like he’s spiking the camera on the Office, and drums his fingers on Usnavi’s thigh in an _excuse me_ way, though he only holds the expression for a few seconds before his mouth goes all wiggly in a suppressed smile.

“I didn’t mean—“ Usnavi’s laughing too much to finish his sentence. “No, I meant in a good way, like…I did kinda think it would hurt some? And it don’t?”

“I said it wouldn’t if we did it right,” Ruben says. Usnavi can feel the way it shifts inside him when Ruben sits up straighter to meet their mouths together, kisses confident and body still moving tentatively, gently. "You good?”

Is he? Usnavi lifts his hips just a little, goes back down, the way Ruben slides out then in and how it feels like much more than it really can be from such a small movement. “Yeah,” he says, his voice sounding oddly ethereal. “Yeah, I’m real good.”

Quiet accustoming builds eventually to noise: the bed starting to creak, Ruben huffing something just too quiet to be called a grunt at every thrust, the faint sound now there’s enough momentum for Ruben’s hips to hit against Usnavi’s ass with a little more force. A sensation that rings out somewhere deep that Usnavi didn’t know sensation could happen, all over and nowhere and slightly outside himself at once. His toes curl up with it.

“Yo, _what?_ ” he says. “Do that again.”

Ruben does, keeps doing it when he hears the torrent of nonsense Spanish-English-whimper-moan that involuntarily pushes out of Usnavi’s mouth each stroke. Usnavi rides down and Ruben rides up and they’ve obviously been doin’ the do the whole time but like, all of a sudden they are _doing_ it, you know? A building in-out-in until they’re going so hard that Ruben accidentally slips out; they both groan. Ruben guides himself back in babbling “oh my god, you’re so hot, oh my _god_ ”, rolling Usnavi so they’re both lying on their sides facing each other, Usnavi with his legs still wrapped round Ruben’s back.

It isn’t the most eloquent dirty talk, and Usnavi would usually tease him for it but the only thing he’s coherent enough to say right now himself is “fuck, fuck, fuck me, Ruben, _fuck me,”_ like Ruben might stop if he don’t keep telling him. He takes Ruben’s hand and curls it round his own dick with an encouraging movement that Ruben picks up fast, Usnavi’s fast falling into a point of no return and not quite close enough, like reaching for something on a high shelf where your fingers just brush the edge - almost got it, almost, come _on._

“More, harder, Ruben, _yes_ —“, then Ruben finds that spot again, keeps hitting it. It wrenches climax out of Usnavi in a way he’s never felt it before, deep and rolling like bassline vibration and then drop the fucking beat. Ruben’s hips start working erratically the second Usnavi tightens round him, Ruben’s hand all wet pawing haphazardly at Usnavi’s back and his hair but Usnavi doesn’t care right now, just holds onto him with his fingers digging so hard in that you could probably take his actual fingerprints from it.

Ruben says, “I’m, I, fuck, where do you want me to—“

“Keep goin', wanna feel you come in me, I want you, love you love you I love you I—“ and the rest of it gets all mixed into the noise Ruben makes as he finishe. They lie still interlocked together and almost motionless except that Ruben’s shuddering and Usnavi’s legs keep twitching, until Ruben says in a very tiny voice, a long time later: “oh wow.”

“Yup,” Usnavi says, nosing against Ruben’s shoulder and the side of his face. His hair is all fluffy and ticklish and gets in Usnavi’s mouth. “That just happened. In real life!”

“Mmmhmm. Was it—how was it for you?”

“Fuckin’…yeah,” Usnavi says, and laughs at his own speechlessness. “A real whole lot of yeah. It was… surreal.”

“That’s definitely the word I was hoping you’d use.”

“It was _awesome_ ,” Usnavi says, which doesn’t seem like enough, but they don’t make words enough for some things. “We’re definitely doin’ it again someday _._ Damn. Uh, did you get come in my hair?”

Ruben pats the back of Usnavi’s head to check. “Yeah. Sorry.”

“Gross.” He doesn’t give a shit really, but Ruben takes it as a cue to leave so all Usnavi’s left with is a unpleasant damp trickle as Ruben finally slides out and sits up at the side of the bed like he’s about to leave.

“No, wait, hold on,” Usnavi says, and is surprised at the thickness of his voice and the tremble in his lip.

Ruben catches it too, eyes going wide. “Usnavi,” he says, in the same tone Vanessa did that time she had to safeword for him. “Querido, what’s wrong?”

“I just- it just—“ damn, he doesn’t even know, it feels like someone’s inflating a balloon inside his heart. He got _fucked_ and it was amazing, and Ruben is amazing, and Ruben was inside him and now he isn’t any more, and he wants to be back in that moment and he wants to have Vanessa here to share it with them and life is just a whole lot of big everything, ain’t it, and all of it is finite which only makes it mean so much more and Usnavi didn’t even know that post-banged ecstatically existential _was_ an emotion but here he is.

Ruben doesn’t pick up on any of that and is hesitantly hovering his hands near Usnavi, not touching him but Usnavi wishes he would. “Should I...I don’t know what to—did I hurt you? Or —“

“No, I’m great,” Usnavi says, and he means it. “I just…I love you so much. I love you so _goddamn_ much and it’s kinda makin' my face leak but I’m fuckin’ stellar, I’m fuckin’ _inter_ stellar _,_ I swear.”

Ruben gives a relieved little laugh, lets his hand drop to rest on Usnavi’s chest. “I love you too. Even though your hair is full of come.”

“We’ll shower later. Can we just… hang out a while? Stay with me?”

“We can hang out,” Ruben says, lying back down and shifts one leg so it’s pressed in between both of Usnavi’s, and his fingers against the back of Usnavi’s neck write messages Usnavi can’t follow, but he thinks he understands them anyway. “We’ll hang out. I’ve got you.”


End file.
